Chapter 5
Establishing a Firm Foundation
In This Chapter
Uncovering the roots of segregation
Making their presence known
Staring down hatred and violence
Integrating public schools
Boycotting the buses
Supporting civil rights with legislation
The civil rights movement, which began during the late 1950s, was a defining event of the 1960s. The recognition of equality and the extension of rights to African Americans that are taken for granted today were the direct result of monumental actions undertaken by America’s black community and their supporters during the sixties. But changes don’t take place in a vacuum — especially when they’re as important as those resulting from the civil rights movement. So, to fully understand the events of the ’60s you need to take a look at how the U.S. and the black freedom struggle got to that point.
In this chapter, we take a quick look at a post–Civil War push for equality and the stiff resistance that delayed its realization. We then turn our attention to times and events much closer to the 1960s — the United States after World War II, especially in the 1950s, as events in that decade established the path the would lead the civil rights movement through the ’60s. Gradually, in the second half of the 20th century, blacks began to push again for the promise that America was supposed to fulfill.
The Post–Civil War Era and Jim Crow
From their sale in Africa to the horrific trips across the Atlantic Ocean and their enslavement throughout the New World, blacks have fought to be treated with dignity and equality under the law. Even after the Civil War ended in 1865, and the addition of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution in 1865, which freed all slaves, blacks weren’t equal members of American society. For the most part, whites refused to treat blacks as equals; even the Northern states housed a great number of whites who were hostile, scornful, and fearful of blacks, even if they didn’t express it as openly or violently.
To make it possible for blacks to vote and also bring the southern states back into the Union, Congress implemented a Reconstruction Act, which lasted from 1866 to 1877. Under Reconstruction, the southern states were placed under military rule and were required to meet strict conditions in order to be readmitted to the Union, including ratification of the 14th Amendment, which granted full citizenship to blacks, and the 15th Amendment, which insured the right to vote (for men only, just as it was for whites). Almost all the southern states refused — they saw Reconstruction as a humiliating effort to destroy their way of life and wouldn’t ratify the amendments. Only through the use of the Force Acts (enacted between 1870 and 1875 and imposed penalties on Southerners who tried to obstruct the Reconstruction program) as well as the presence of northern troops, were southern states forced to comply on the issue.
However, blacks made some important headway during Reconstruction:
They hit the books. When freed Southern blacks got the opportunity to go to schools (a right that was routinely denied to slaves), people of all ages took advantage of the opportunity to become literate.
They ran for office (and won). Black men became involved in local, state, and national government.
They made some bread and bought some dirt. Or, if you prefer the non-’60s-slang version, they took advantage of opportunities to acquire land and secure employment.
Amidst a highly disputed presidential election of 1876 between Democrat Samuel Tilden and Republican Rutherford B. Hayes, the two political parties made a corrupt bargain. The disputed election went to Hayes after Southern Democrats agreed to accept the Republican win if the North pulled its troops out of the southern states, which in turn ended Reconstruction in 1877. With northern troops gone, the southern states began to roll back the gains made by blacks in the post–Civil War period.
In 1896 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the Plessy v. Ferguson case that “separate but equal” facilities weren’t contrary to the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which guaranteed civil rights to all citizens. Segregation (the separation of people according to race) clearly made schools, drinking fountains, and restaurants separate, yet the government did little to ensure that the facilities were equal. For the most part, all “equal” meant was that facilities existed, and the facilities for blacks were routinely inferior. Few changes were made until the 1954 Supreme Court ruling of Brown v. Topeka Board of Education case, which required desegregation (see the section “Exposing the fallacy of separate and equal,” later in this chapter).
Demanding a Place in American Society
Up through World War II, blacks remained on the margins of the larger American society. Because of white prejudice, getting a good education or a high paying job was difficult if not impossible, which left blacks out of the mainstream and, therefore, mostly invisible to the white community. After World War II, however, blacks became far more visible to the larger white society in the United States, due in part to their service to the country. In this section, we detail how some folks took advantage of whatever opportunities were available and, in the process, challenged stereotypes and fought against unequal treatment. Of course, the following groups, individuals, and actions are by no means the whole story. They do, however, provide a glimpse into what it took to achieve large-scale success in the decades before the sixties.
Stepping out on the frontlines
From the time blacks came to the colonies, they fought alongside their white neighbors. From fighting for freedom in the Civil War to playing an instrumental role in shaping the American West as “buffalo soldiers” (fighting Mexican revolutionaries, American Indians, and outlaws and repairing buildings, stringing telegraph wire, and protecting the men who built the railroads), African Americans have a long history of displaying valor for a country that didn’t accept them as equals. Even when fighting for their country, it was common for blacks to be in separate military units. Often, their quarters and supplies were inferior, their white leaders were inexperienced, and they were thrown into the most dangerous missions.
With the formation of the famed 66th Air Force Flying School at the all-black Tuskegee Institute the heroism of African American soldiers was ready to take center stage. Throughout the war, the 99th Squadron, the first group of men trained at the Tuskegee Institute, racked up an impressive number of victories with strikes against German forces in Italy. Unlike contributions in earlier wars, the squadron’s victories, as well as the indignities of fighting in a segregated army, garnered the attention of correspondents. Despite their success, many people criticized them, which made them work even harder — they felt that they had to be better and braver than whites, because their performance would affect all other blacks in the military.
Although an integrated military has offered a wealth of opportunities to blacks and other minorities, it came at a large cost. In the Vietnam War, as well as the Gulf War in the 1990s and the War in Iraq shortly after the turn of the millennium, blacks and other minorities were represented in a large proportion. Although the Vietnam War (see Chapters 8, 9, and 10) involved a military draft, whites were better able to take advantage of deferments. After the draft was abolished, recruiters began targeting minorities in poor communities, offering them education as well as a feeling of belonging and dignity. Consequently, a larger proportion of blacks and other minorities die in war than whites.
Claiming first place
At one time, blacks were almost completely excluded from participating in sports together with whites. In the 21st century, sports are seen as an almost completely integrated field of dreams. In the 1960s, not only did black athletes make their mark on the playing fields, but they also spoke up for issues affecting larger society. Jim Brown, who played with the Cleveland Browns from 1957 to 1965, spoke out on civil rights issues, and Muhammad Ali (see Chapter 16) took a stand against the Vietnam War.
Making the Majors
Baseball was America’s pastime, but until 1947, it existed in two parallel universes — black and white. Blacks were excluded from Major League Baseball; instead, they had leagues of their own: the Negro National League (formed in 1933) and the Negro American League (established in 1937). The Negro Leagues had a roster of celebrity players, such as Satchel Paige and Josh Gibson, who could equal, if not surpass, the most celebrated stars of the American and National Leagues.
Jackie Robinson, infielder for the Brooklyn Dodgers, was the man who broke the color barrier. In 1945, while playing in the Negro Leagues, he caught the attention of Dodgers’ owner Branch Rickey, who signed Robinson to the Montreal Royals, a Dodgers’ farm team. On April 15, 1947, Robinson was called up to the major leagues and made his first appearance at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn. Although he was often snubbed by teammates and harassed by fans and opposing teams, he persevered, playing a great game and earning respect (although sometimes grudgingly) from players and fans. Robinson knew his worth and refused to be grateful to the white men for his opportunities; as such, whites often criticized him for “not knowing his place.” After Jackie Robinson, baseball — and, in fact, all sports in America — was never the same.
Racing to the finish line
In 1936, the Olympic games were played in Nazi Germany. These games, Hitler hoped, would prove to the world that the Aryan race was superior and that the Germans would take the lion’s share of the medals. However, Jesse Owens, track star from Ohio State, disproved Hitler’s theory. Owens won the 100-meter dash, the 200-meter dash, and the broad jump. In spite of his accomplishments, Owens’ race prevented him from cashing in on his fame and prowess. In the 1930s, no company would offer an endorsement contract to a black athlete, so he had to resort to racing in exhibitions against other people, animals, and even vehicles.
Wilma Rudolph was another Olympic track star who overcame poverty and racism to become a top athlete. A childhood survivor of scarlet fever and polio, she was determined to excel, playing basketball and running track in high school and college. In the 1960 Olympic games in Rome, Rudolph earned the title “World’s Fastest Woman” by winning gold medals for the 100-meter dash, the 200-meter dash (setting an Olympic record), and as part of the 400-meter relay team (setting a world record).
Gaining freedom through song and stage
Blacks have always been prominent in the field of music, although mainly in the black world, in the genres of jazz and blues. However, some pre-sixties entertainers not only crossed the color line, but crashed through it, making powerful friends and enemies along the way. Here are just a few of those entertainers — all of them, in their own way, fought racism rather than accept the status quo.
Opening night at the Lincoln Memorial
Born in 1902, classically trained opera singer Marian Anderson was acclaimed, mostly in Europe, for her concert performances. When she returned to the United States, Anderson performed at benefits for Howard University (a black institution in Washington, D.C.), singing to larger crowds each year. In 1939, the university was forced to look for a larger venue for its annual benefit, mostly because of Anderson’s fame. They tried to lease Constitution Hall from the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) but were turned down, ostensibly because it was booked; however, the DAR was known for refusing to rent to blacks.
Both black and white citizens were outraged that an acclaimed artist such as Anderson couldn’t perform at Constitution Hall. In fact, the outrage reached all the way to the top of D.C. power — First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt resigned from the DAR in protest, writing about her decision in her column My Day, which was published in newspapers across the country. To find a place for Anderson’s concert, Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes arranged for her performance at the Lincoln Memorial. On Easter Sunday, 1939, she sang in front of Lincoln’s statue, an impressive and enduring image of an effort to protest racism and discrimination at the highest level of government.
Making popular music
Blacks also made their mark in jazz and popular music during the ’50s and early ’60s. Nat “King” Cole moved from the world of jazz to popular music during the 1940s, and during his career, broke a number of barriers. In 1948, he was the first black jazz performer to have his own radio show, and in 1956, was the first black entertainer to have a weekly show on network TV. However, the show was cancelled in 1957, because national sponsors didn’t want to invest in a “black” show.
Ray Charles was another musician who embraced a variety of musical genres. From the late ’40s until his death in 2004, Ray Charles performed jazz, gospel, country, R&B, pop, and rock ’n’ roll, and attracted fans across color lines. Charles took a public stand against racism by refusing to play in segregated venues, and he supported civil rights in the ’60s.
Taking the stage and speaking out
From 1924 until 1947, Paul Robeson was a famous performer. Robeson was a singer, accomplished athlete, author, and actor — but through much of his life, his political activism often eclipsed his talent. Son of a slave and educated as a lawyer, Robeson loved performing and appeared in several of Eugene O’Neill’s plays, including Emperor Jones, and gave impressive performances in Shakespeare’s Othello. But Robeson was as dedicated to social ideals as he was to performing, and he actively fought racism and fascism at home and abroad. He counted people such as Eleanor Roosevelt, W. E. B. DuBois, Lena Horne, and Harry Truman among his friends.
During the Red Scare of the 1950s, marked by fear of Communism (see Chapter 11 for more about McCarthyism), Robeson was considered as a threat to American democracy because of his visits to the Soviet Union and his questioning of why blacks should support a government that treated them poorly. When the House Un-American Affairs Committee condemned him, the State Department revoked and confiscated his passport. Eight years passed before it was restored and he was again able to travel abroad. However, today people remember him as one of the African American performers who used his intelligence, talent, and fame to help others.
Creating a cultural center — the Harlem Renaissance
As a center of black culture, writers, artists, and performers thrived in Harlem in the 1920s and ’30s. The movement was collectively called the New Negro Movement and later referred to as the Harlem Renaissance. Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, Zora Neale Hurston, and W. E. B. DuBois are among the best-known writers of the period. Black theater and the visual arts flourished as well. The Cotton Club was a showcase for some of the best black entertainers of the day, including Josephine Baker, Lena Horne, Cab Calloway, Duke Ellington, and Bessie Smith.
However, the Harlem Renaissance wasn’t just about the arts and culture — it was also about Black Nationalism. Many of the artists and writers supported Marcus Garvey (a leader who promoted separatism for blacks and repatriation for all immigrants to their countries of origin to preserve their heritage), a more positive self-image, and a more positive image among the white community (which didn’t affect many white Americans, who had no concept of black life).
Working within the government
After Reconstruction and before the civil rights movement of the 1960s, few blacks were involved in government. One controversial congressman, Adam Clayton Powell, definitely made his presence and opinions known, and because of it, aroused the ire of his colleagues in Congress. Ralph Bunche, who worked for peace on an international scale, and Thurgood Marshall, who argued the Brown v. Topeka Board of Education case in 1954, were two other African Americans at the top levels of government.
Reaching Capitol Hill
Adam Clayton Powell Jr., a New York preacher and politician, could make things happen. In 1944, he was elected as the first post-Reconstruction black congressman. While in Congress, Powell fought for civil rights and worked for desegregation. Some of his more important accomplishments include the integration of whites and blacks in House of Representatives facilities, the accreditation of black reporters to the House of Representatives, and the desegregation of the U.S. Naval Academy.
Powell also fought to ban poll taxes and tried to attach antidiscrimination clauses to most appropriations measures (the allocation of money for some specific purposes). But Powell wasn’t popular with all his colleagues, and in 1967, he was accused of misusing government funds and was refused his seat in the House. He took his case to the Supreme Court, which vindicated him, and cited racism as the reason for the trumped-up charges; however, his reputation was just about ruined by all the media coverage. But in 1969, Powell regained his seat, which he used to protest the Vietnam War.
Working for world peace
Ralph Bunche, an educator, scholar, and diplomat, gained international fame through his work at the United Nations. He participated in drafting the U.N. charter and worked for colonial nations that were pressing for self-government. His most important work was as the U.N. mediator on Palestine, where he negotiated an armistice between Israel and the Arab nations. For this achievement, Bunche was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1950.
Taking it all the way to the Supreme Court
Although some black leaders later condemned Marshall for his moderate views on integration rather than pressing for black power, he believed that integration was the only way to achieve equality and justice in American society. He was also convinced that integration could only be achieved through the law — peaceful protest excited passion and gathered publicity but accomplished little, and violent revolution and continued racial separation would only aggravate racism.
As a Supreme Court justice, Marshall consistently supported liberal causes. Besides promoting integration, he advocated women’s rights, reproductive freedom, and affirmative action. He consistently opposed the death penalty. As Republican presidents occupied the White House and more conservative justices joined the court, Marshall was often part of the minority opinion, but he persisted in advocating the causes that were important to him. Even when his health began to fail, Marshall resisted resigning as long as possible, in order to maintain a liberal presence in the court.
Enduring the Brutality of Racial Violence
Fear often brings about violence. And whites, especially in the South, probably had good reason to fear blacks — their population was large, and they justifiably resented their treatment at the hands of whites. So whites not only made sure that blacks stayed away from them, but they lashed out, often violently, against them.
The aim and end of lynch mobs
Many people say that the Ku Klux Klan, with their robes, masks, and burning crosses, existed mainly to terrorize and intimidate blacks. However, their actions were actually much more brutal — they often beat, whipped, and tortured their victims. However, lynching (an execution by hanging, by a mob) was the most brutal of all. The years from the end of Reconstruction (1877) to the beginning of the Great Depression (1929) saw the greatest number of lynchings, mostly in the southern states, although it continued, on a much lesser scale, into the 1960s.
However, lynching wasn’t the exclusive province of the Klan, as other white supremacist organizations utilized the same tactics. Often, ordinary citizens banded together to form a mob and acted as police, judge, jury, and executioner, sometimes for relatively minor infractions, and sometimes for no reason at all. Lynch mobs preferred doling out their punishments in public places in order to inspire fear among the black community. But blacks weren’t the only victims of lynching — whites who protested vigilante justice were also targets of mob rule.
The murder of Emmett Till
Emmett Till, a 14-year-old from Chicago, was visiting relatives in Mississippi in the summer of 1955. As teenagers do, he was hanging out with friends in front of a local store. His friends dared him to talk to a white woman, and he did, bidding goodbye to the store owner’s wife. Several days later, two white men rousted him out of his uncle’s house, and three days later, his mutilated body was pulled from the Tallahatchie River.
Till’s mother had his body shipped back to Chicago, and pictures of her son were all over the media. People all over the country were horrified, even southern whites. However, the worst horror was yet to come — despite overwhelming evidence, Till’s murderers were acquitted.
More than perhaps any other incident until that time, the murder of Emmett Till united blacks — those living in the North, though many miles from Mississippi, saw how vulnerable they were. And whites, some for the first time, were forced to see the injustice and brutality of racism.
Integrating the Schools
Up through the 1950s, many American public schools were segregated by race. Southern states drew the line with local legislation confirmed by the 1896 Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson, which determined that separate public facilities were constitutional as long as they were equal. Although the decision was originally made in a case about segregated railroad cars, local laws applied the principle to almost all other public facilities, including restaurants, theaters, restrooms, recreational facilities, and public schools.
Exposing the fallacy of separate and equal
The case came about in 1951 when a black man, Oliver Brown, wanted to send his daughter Linda to the elementary school closest to her home, a white school in Topeka, Kansas. When he tried to enroll her, the principal refused. Brown asked the local NAACP to represent him and they agreed, because it was a great opportunity to pursue a school desegregation case.
At first, the case went before the Federal District Court in Kansas. The Board of Education argued that segregated schools realistically prepared blacks for a life of segregation, but Brown’s lawyers claimed that separate schools implied inferiority. Although the court heard and largely agreed with arguments contending that separate schools were implicitly unequal, they upheld the board’s right to keep Topeka’s schools segregated, because of the precedent set by Plessy v. Ferguson.
When Brown and the NAACP, led by lawyer Thurgood Marshall (see the “Taking it all the way to the Supreme Court” section), appealed to the Supreme Court on October 1, 1951, the case was combined with other cases challenging school segregation. The Supreme Court heard the case several times between 1952 and 1954 before reaching a decision. Finally, on May 17, 1954, the court overturned the “separate but equal” doctrine because it violated the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, mandating that schools be integrated with “all deliberate speed.”
Brown v. Topeka Board of Education was hailed as a great victory for integration, but the long-term results didn’t reflect the initial euphoria. “All deliberate speed” was very loosely interpreted, and many communities instead exercised the principle of “all deliberate deliberation.” Also, even in states where segregation hadn’t been legally mandated, schools reflected their segregated communities. The Brown decision caused minorities to question these “de facto” segregated schools, which often were in old, inferior buildings and had inexperienced teachers and fewer funds to spend on textbooks, labs, and other educational materials.
In 1970 a federal judge in North Carolina ordered school busing in an effort to end de facto segregation (which resulted from racially segregated neighborhoods rather than from schools segregated by law). A year later, the Supreme Court upheld the use of busing to achieve integration. In 1974, when a judge mandated busing in Boston, protests and violence were as vocal and violent as some of the protests in the South during the 1960s.
Desegregating Central High School
Almost immediately after Brown v. Topeka Board of Education, the school board of Little Rock Arkansas announced that it would begin to implement the new law, and by 1957 made plans to gradually desegregate the public schools. They planned to integrate the high schools first, followed by the junior high and elementary schools. Everyone expected that the plan would go smoothly because the University of Arkansas’s law school had been integrated since 1949, and seven of its eight state universities were desegregated by 1957. In addition, many other public facilities, such as transportation, parks, and libraries, were already integrated.
However, Arkansas governor Orval Faubus didn’t get with the program. A confirmed segregationist, he was dead set against integrating the schools, and on September 2, called out the Arkansas National Guard to prevent nine black students from entering Little Rock Central High School. However, the troops were withdrawn on September 20 when a federal injunction prohibited using the National Guard to prevent integration.
On September 23, police surrounded the school and escorted the nine black students inside. However, after the anti-integrationists found out that the blacks were inside, they began to storm the school. Fearing mob violence, the administration got the nine black students out of the building.
Finally, the state of Arkansas realized that they needed federal help. On September 24, Little Rock mayor Woodrow Mann sent a telegram to President Eisenhower requesting troops. Eisenhower federalized the Arkansas National Guard to remove them from Faubus’s control, and the next day, under protection of Arkansas National Guard and 1,000 members of the 101st Airborne Division of the United States Army, the nine black students entered Little Rock Central High School. In spite of the apprehension of students, parents, faculty, and administration, integration of Central High School went better than expected. Most people were determined to obey the law, and few incidents occurred. In spite of angry citizens and the governor, Arkansas desegregated its schools. Faubus was reelected as governor six times and became more moderate over the years. However, in 1965, after passage of the Voting Rights Act, which enabled more blacks to vote (see Chapter 7), Faubus was defeated and was never reelected.
Rosa Parks and the Bus Boycott
Staking a claim to her seat
On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, a seamstress from Montgomery, Alabama, got on a bus to head home from work. Though she hated the indignity of the seating arrangement, she went to the back of the bus, which was the only place where blacks were allowed to sit. However, blacks were required by law to give up their seats in the back if a white person asked.
In 1955, the back of the bus was considered the colored section, a term that was considered polite, if somewhat demeaning. Through subsequent decades, Negro, black, and African American became the preferred terms.
On that fateful day, when the front (white) section of the bus filled up, a white man asked Parks to give up her seat in the back, and she refused. Contrary to popular legend, she didn’t refuse just because she was tired. Rather, she was sick and tired of being treated like a second-class citizen. When she refused to give up her seat, the white bus driver threatened to call the police, but she held her ground. The police arrived and Parks was escorted to the police station, where she was fingerprinted and then released on bail after talking to an NAACP lawyer (see Figure 5-1).
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Figure 5-1: Rosa Parks and one of her attorneys, Charles Langford. |
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©Bettmann/CORBIS
Rosa Parks didn’t become an activist because of this incident. By 1955, she was already working for civil rights. She was active in the Montgomery Voters League, an organization established to help blacks pass the literacy tests designed to keep them from registering to vote. She was also involved in the NAACP, and she had already recognized and begun to protest the indignity of segregation. Whenever possible, she avoided elevators and buses, preferring to walk or climb stairs rather than be treated as inferior.
Boycotting the buses
The day after Rosa Parks’s arrest, the word went out among Montgomery’s black community. The Women’s Political Council decided to protest her mistreatment by organizing a bus boycott to begin on December 5, the day of Parks’s trial. However, the plan wasn’t to keep the boycott small — Martin Luther King Jr. and others in Montgomery’s black community formed the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) to continue boycotting the buses until the segregation laws were changed. The main objective of the boycott was to end segregation in the Montgomery public transportation system and also to hire black bus drivers in Montgomery.
Although the MIA expected the boycott to be a success, it exceeded their wildest expectations. Almost all of Montgomery’s black community avoided the buses, walking, taking cabs, organizing carpools, and even riding mules to get to where they were going. Often, whites refused to be without their domestic workers and drove them back and forth to work.
The boycott lasted for 382 days, costing the bus company a great deal of money, but the city refused to give in. Boycott leaders filed a federal lawsuit against Montgomery’s segregation laws, claiming that the city violated the 14th Amendment. On June 4, 1956, a federal court ruled that the segregation laws were unconstitutional, but Montgomery county lawyers appealed. The boycott continued until November 13, when the Supreme Court declared the Montgomery segregation laws illegal.
During the boycott, the authorities made numerous arrests. At one point, the police arrested groups of blacks waiting for carpool pickups. On February 21, 1956, a grand jury declared the boycott illegal, and 115 boycott leaders were arrested.
The Civil Rights Act of 1957
The first significant civil rights legislation since 1875 was the Civil Rights Act of 1957, passed during the Eisenhower administration. Although President Dwight Eisenhower never actively supported integration and civil rights (he believed that laws couldn’t change people’s beliefs), he did support the Civil Rights Act, possibly as a reaction to the public’s outcry against the violence in Little Rock, Arkansas (see the “Desegregating Central High School” section earlier in the chapter). The main focus of the Civil Rights Act was to support and enforce voting rights for blacks by creating a nonpartisan division of the Justice Department to monitor and report on civil rights abuses. The bill provided for
Creation of a bipartisan Commission on Civil Rights to study racial discrimination and recommend remedial legislation.
Enhancement of the Civil Rights Section of the Justice Department.
Empowerment of the attorney general to secure court injunctions in civil rights cases so that they could be heard in federal court.
Increase in the power of the Justice Department to seek injunctions against anyone interfering with the right to vote.
From the beginning, passing the act was difficult. Southern senators did their best to take the teeth out of the bill. However, Northern Democrats and Republicans wanted the Civil Rights Act to pass, in part to secure black and liberal votes in the next election (without losing the white southern vote).
Lyndon Johnson, a Democrat and the Senate majority leader (see Chapter 3), had to straddle the fence on the Civil Rights Act to preserve party unity as well as his political career. He didn’t want to alienate the southerners in the party, who opposed the bill, but he also wanted to cultivate the black and liberal vote. With his superb skills at negotiating compromise, he managed to get a civil rights act passed without alienating either side.